1. Event Operating System
  2. Budget & costs
  3. Budget & act costs

Know What Your Event Will Cost Before the Bills Arrive

Budgets drift when the production manager, the booker and the finance lead each keep their own spreadsheet, and an act's fee turns into something much bigger once flights, hotel nights, the agency's cut and per diems are added. With Ticket Fairy your event has one budget, shared by its Budget page and the Event Operating System, with what you planned against what you have spent for every section. Every act's performer page adds up what that act really costs, and act fees, supplier orders, sponsors and crew hours fill your budget from the records your team already keeps, so everyone reads the same numbers.

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  • One budget your whole team trusts
  • The real cost of every act, fee to hotel
  • Committed costs in view before the invoices land
Ticket Fairy event Budget with total expenses, revenue and net, the views by section, stage and day, and lines for talent, venue hire, production, crew and sponsorship

Keep One Budget Your Whole Team Can Trust

Give each section of your budget its planned costs and planned income, record actual costs as they come in, and every section shows how far over or under plan it is. The event's Budget page and the Budget in the Event Operating System are the same budget, so a cost your production manager adds in one shows in the other, and the booker, the finance lead and you all read the same figures.

Build the budget around the way you work: your own sections, with as many planned costs and income lines as each one needs, and a note on any line that needs explaining. The top of the budget sets total expenses against total revenue and shows the net, so you know at a glance whether the event is heading for a surplus or a deficit.

Teams change the same budget at the same time, and nobody loses their work. If a teammate changes a line while you are editing it, you see what it says now and choose whether to save yours over it or keep theirs.

  • Planned and recorded: over or under plan for every section
  • Costs and income: the net for the event at the top of the budget
  • Safe team edits: a teammate's change is never saved over without you knowing

See What Every Act Really Costs, From Fee to Hotel

You agree a fee, then the extras turn it into a much bigger number. The All-in cost card on each act's performer page adds up every part: the fee and deposit from the booking, the agency fee from the offer, each trip from the event's travel, the hotel stay, per diems and backline, and the act's share of your hire and shopping lists. You know what each act costs before the show, while there is still time to change the deal.

Each part says where its figure came from, so nobody keys a cost in twice and nobody wonders where a number came from. Anything still missing a price is named at the foot of the card, so the gaps are obvious before finance asks. Every change to a trip's cost or a stay's room rate is recorded with its value before and after, who changed it and when.

The same figures reach your budget and the show's settlement. In the budget, the suggested total for Artists & talent includes every act's all-in cost, and in the settlement the travel, hotel and per diems appear as show costs with the agency fee beside the performer fee, each counted once.

  • What this act costs: one total at the top of the performer page
  • From your records: booking, offer, travel, hotel, payments due and hire
  • Not priced yet: anything still missing a price, named on the card
  • Same figures in the settlement: no flight or hotel counted twice
Ticket Fairy All-in cost card for an act, with totals in euros and pounds and the fee, deposit, agency fee, two trips, the hotel, per diems, backline and hospitality

Count the Agency's Cut From the Moment the Offer Is Agreed

Add the agency fee to the offer as a fixed amount or a percentage of the fee, and it joins the act's cost the moment the agent accepts. A percentage is worked out on the fee the deal really pays, so a versus deal or a percentage of the door carries the right agency fee without a separate sum on a calculator.

The agency fee is set out in the offer email, so the agent sees exactly what you agreed to pay on top of the performer's fee, and any change to it is kept in the offer's versions with every other term.

  • Agency fee: a fixed amount or a percentage of the fee
  • From the offer: counted once the offer is accepted or contracted
Ticket Fairy New offer form with the Agency fee section open, Percentage of the fee chosen and 10 entered

Price Travel and Hotel Nights at What You Really Paid

Enter what a trip cost once, for everyone on the booking and in the currency you paid, and the act's cost includes it straight away. Hotel nights count at the rate you really pay: the stay's own room rate, or, night by night, the rate of the hotel block it sits in, for the act's own nights and rooms only.

A band flying from two cities, a DJ with a tour manager and a headliner on a block booking each come out right without a spreadsheet. Empty rooms in a hotel block stay a cost of the block, so no act carries rooms nobody slept in, and each currency keeps its own total, so a fee in pounds and a flight in euros never get muddled together.

  • Enter the cost: one amount for everyone on the booking
  • Room rate a night: the stay's own rate, or the hotel block's rate
  • Paid currency: kept in the currency the trip was paid in
Ticket Fairy dialog asking what the travel for a traveller cost, with the amount for the whole booking and its currency

See the Money You Have Committed Before the Invoices Arrive

Committed with suppliers shows money you have promised but not yet paid: approved purchase orders, performers' per diems and backline, and hire and shopping items marked ordered. You see your real exposure weeks before the bills land, so a production overspend shows up while you can still trim the order.

An item on a purchase order counts once, even when it is also on your hire list, so the committed figure is one you can rely on. A cancelled order drops out, and the order stays on record with the reason it was cancelled.

  • Purchase orders: approved, sent and invoiced orders
  • Per diems and backline: the costs added for each performer
  • Hire and shopping: items marked ordered on your lists

Start Each Section From a Total Your Own Records Suggest

An empty section offers a suggested total from what your event already holds, ready to adopt as its first planned cost with one tap. Artists & talent adds up every act's all-in cost, Sponsorship counts your sponsors' cash and in-kind deals, Vendors counts booth fees and Accessibility counts your accessibility provisions, so a new budget starts close to the truth.

A conference sees each speaker's fee, a food and drink festival its vendors' booth fees and a festival its sponsors' deals. Ticket and add-on sales come in as live income, and fees, deposits, sponsors and booth fees fill in as lines marked as worked out for you, so you add by hand only what nothing else records.

  • Use suggested: a planned total from your own records
  • Sponsorship and Vendors: sponsor deals and booth fees as income
  • Live income: ticket and add-on sales as they happen

Put Staff and Crew Costs in the Budget From Their Hours

Give a shift its outside team and a cost per hour, and the Staff and crew section fills in by itself: the cost of the hours you approved, plus the scheduled cost of the hours not approved yet. Agency stewards, bar teams and security sit in the budget beside everything else, with no separate timesheet sum at the end of the event.

Hours by outside team shows each agency or company with the hours recorded, the hours approved and the approved cost, so you can check their invoice against the hours you signed off before you pay it.

  • Cost per hour: set on each shift
  • Outside team: the agency or company that supplies the people
  • Approved hours: what the shift really cost once hours are approved
Ticket Fairy Edit shift dialog for a steward shift, with an event staffing agency as the outside team and 14.50 as the cost per hour

Read the Budget by Section, Stage or Show Day

Switch between all lines, your sections, each stage and each show day to see what the main stage or Saturday really costs. Filters split expenses from income and the lines worked out for you from the ones your team entered, and a search finds any line in seconds. Download the budget as a CSV whenever finance or a partner asks for it.

Ask Fai, the assistant inside your dashboard, what the event has spent against plan, what an act costs all in or which section is furthest over. She can add a planned cost, record an actual cost, change a section or enter the cost of a trip or a stay's room rate, and she shows you each change and waits for your yes first.

  • By stage and by day: what each stage and show day costs
  • Filters and search: expenses, income, and lines worked out for you
  • Download CSV: every line, ready for finance
  • Ask Fai: answers from the budget, changes after your yes

How Organisers Keep Their Costs in Line With Ticket Fairy

  • A Three-Day Festival

    The production manager plans each stage's costs and the finance lead watches Committed with suppliers as orders are approved. Six weeks out the By Stage view shows the second stage over plan, and the team trims its lighting order before the invoice arrives.

  • A Club Promoter Booking International DJs

    Each DJ's performer page adds the fee, the agency's 10%, two flights and two hotel nights. The promoter sees one act costs nearly double its fee and moves the next booking to a local support act.

  • A Conference With Paid Speakers

    Artists & talent suggests a total from every speaker's fee and travel, adopted with one tap. The organiser adds venue hire and catering by hand and has a full budget on the first afternoon.

  • A Food and Drink Festival

    Vendors fills in booth fees as income and Sponsorship counts the brewery's cash and in-kind deal. The organiser sees the net at the top of the budget and knows the event covers its costs before tickets go on sale.

  • An Arena Show With Agency Stewards

    Each steward shift has the staffing agency and a cost per hour. Approved hours fill the Staff and crew section, and the agency's invoice is checked against the approved cost before it is paid.

Set It Up Step by Step

Questions About Your Event Budget and Act Costs

Budget & act costs

Yes. The Budget section of the Event Operating System and the event menu's Budget page show one budget, so a planned cost added in either shows in both.

You need an owner or admin role on the event to change planned and recorded costs. Teammates who can open the budget but may not change it see it read only. You need an owner, admin or producer role to see an act's all-in cost.

The second person sees what the line says now and keeps what they entered. Save to replace it with your change, or cancel to keep your teammate's.

The Budget section and the All-in cost card total each currency on its own and never add them together, and a section planned in more than one currency says so. The event's Budget page can also show every line in one display currency you choose.

On a standard section with no planned cost yet: Artists & talent, Sponsorship, Accessibility and Vendors. Staff and crew shows once a shift has a cost per hour or the section already exists.

Once it is approved. Sent and invoiced orders still count, and a cancelled order no longer does.

The deposit is part of the fee, so adding it would count it twice. It counts on its own only when the booking has no fee.

No. An act counts only the nights and rooms of its own stay. Empty rooms are a cost of the block, shown in the block itself.

Yes, after you confirm. Its planned and recorded costs go too, here and on the event's Budget page, and this cannot be undone, so the dashboard asks first.

Yes. Fai reads the budget and every act's all-in cost, and she adds planned costs, records actual costs, changes sections and enters a trip's cost or a stay's room rate when you ask. She shows you each change and waits for your yes first.

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The Ticket Fairy, Inc. is a fintech company and technology platform. The Ticket Fairy, Inc. is not a bank, financial institution, or regulated financial services provider. Vault banking services are provided through regulated banking partners. Ticket Fairy Capital financing is provided by third-party private credit partners. The Ticket Fairy, Inc. does not make credit decisions, and all funding terms, approvals and conditions are determined by those lending partners.